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This isn’t my first blog about the best place to buy school supplies, and I’m sure it won’t be the last! But we’re smack dab in the middle of all of these amazing back-to-school deals and I’ve gone through the top store’s weekly ads and found you ALL the bargains! I literally geek out over school supplies, so please excuse me! Not to mention, I’m a list maker and I go through tons and tons of paper so when I can get a notebook for $.17, you KNOW I’m going to jump all over it.

Target – Weekly Ad

This week at Target, if you spend $30 or more on school supplies, you’ll get a $5 Target gift card. And if you spend $50 or more on school supplies, you can get a pretty cool $10 Target gift card. Text SCHOOL5 for the $5 gift card coupon or SCHOOL10 for the $10 gift card coupon.

WALMART – Weekly Ad

I’m going to be honest with you, Walmart is my favorite place to buy the back-to-school basics because they probably have the best deals! I mean, you can get a binder, some binder dividers, a notebook, and a folder for UNDER $3! I use binders and notebooks and folders all the time and I’m almost 30!.. Well, I mean I’m almost 28, allow me to not get carried away!

STAPLES – Weekly Ad

Office Depot – Weekly Ad

Office Depot is doing something kinda cool. As long as you spend a minimum of $5, you can get packs of loose sleeved paper for $.01. You cannot beat that!

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You can get TONS of school supplies when there are such great deals out there, but not all kids are quite as lucky. My friend Nick, founder of the non-profit Make Caring Cool, has started a back-to-school initiative where he’s trying to collect enough supplies for all the kids in two schools in the Norfolk, VA area! A lot of the children in these two schools come from low income homes and dont have the tools they need to succeed everyday at school. I’ve attached a direct link to the donation page below where any amount of money you can donate will go to good use and be very helpful to get these kids the supplies they need, but if you’d like to take a look around at Make Caring Cool’s page, you can click right here. You won’t be disappointed. There’s lots of amazing things going on over there!

Do you know what I hate? When my Bath & Body Works candles are running out of wax. I’ve burned through them and the pretty jar is now basically empty and coming closer and closer to becoming garbage.

Do you know what I love? The jars that the Bath & Body Works candles come in. I love the symmetry and plainness of the jars. They’re so cute! So, I’ve repurposed the jar from candle to cotton ball holder! This is how:

Boil some water

Once the water is boiling, pour it directly into the jar. Sometimes people are afraid that this will shatter the jar but from personal experience, I can tell you that this jar is very sturdy and can definitely withstand boiling water. Once you pour in the boiling water you’ll notice that the water and the candle wax begin to separate.

After about a minute or two take a butter knife and go around the edge of the wax and also around each of the wicks. The wax should be soft enough and this shouldn’t be difficult. If the wax is still tough, give the hot water a few additional minutes to soften the wax.

Once you’ve traced the outline of the wax inside the jar you should be able to pry the wax from the bottom of the jar. If not in one big piece then in a couple of big pieces.

Once the majority of the wax is out you can most likely pry the wicks and the wick stands out very easily. Remove them and allow the remaining wax to rise to the top of the jar.

Once it’s done separating just pour it out. I usually like to let the wax on top harden and throw that away before pouring out the water below it. The sticker on the side of the jar is easy to pull off. As for the sticker on the bottom, it may need a little extra soaking in order to come off. Once all the stickers are off run a soapy sponge over it and let it dry and then it’s ready! You’ve got a really cute jar to do with as you please!

Love these small projects that increase my bathroom storage, especially since I’ve got very minimal storage in my apartment.

This is the time of year when budgets are being made and people are making financial decisions that can change the outcome of their entire year!. It’s also a great time of year to cut some financial fat out of that budget!

When you’re sitting down with your spouse, partner, roommate, or even just with yourself and you’re discussing your budget, make sure you lay everything out on the table and see what you really need to be spending your money on this year.

Like, do you really need to be enrolled in Netflix, Hulu, & Redbox? Probably not. Is that Verizon Fios Quantum High Speed internet really making a huge difference? I can tell you from personal experience, NO! Wasting money on things like disposable coffee cups when it’s way better for your wallet, and not to mention a little thing called the environment, if you just use a regular traveling mug! I didn’t mean to go all green on you.

You don’t need to cut down to the bare necessities but really analyze what it is that you’re actually utilizing!

I’m coming to you live from Brooklyn, NY this morning with a very important tip!

My financial tip for you on this cloudy, damp Friday, is to not stress yourself out over your finances. I’m a worrier by default. I think I inherited it from my mother. I worry about getting a flat tire. I worry about getting places late. But more than anything I always worry about my finances. Worrying isn’t going to help you pay your rent this month, but a solid plan and a strict budget will!

Also, I know I talk about saving money all the time and it’s one of the most important things that you can do, but you also need to live a little. For a few months I’ll be on a savings kick where all I wanna do is just save money because I look at my bank account and I see the benefits of all that savings. And then sometimes I just want to blow it on something fun, like a 2 night stay in Brooklyn and a couple tickets to the Nets vs Heat game which I will be attending tonight! (OMG! Lebron James and I will be in the same room!)

Moral of the story, or of this blog or whatever… Don’t spend all of your time worrying. Spend a little time worrying, a little time having fun, and a lot of time in control! And in the words of my grandfather, when he came to my mother in a dream (true story!), “Don’t worry so much … I worried my whole life and everything always worked out.”

My sister was in NYC for NYE last night and took this awesome picture!

Happy New Year, everyone! I know, I know.. I walk in after a good 6 months of not blogging and think I can just start over without any explanation. Let me start by saying, I apologize. I’ve been fairly busy with work and personal stuff and needed some time to just really think about where I want this blog to go and what I really want to utilize it for. Good news… I’ve made a decision! (Sounds so serious but I promise this is no Lebron James situation here!)

I decided that I really miss blogging and I want to start blogging again regularly. Now, regularly for me might mean two or three times a week but I’m nowhere close to being able to blog every day. I want to bring a lot of useful content to my space and not only help myself becoming a better and more responsible adult but I want to be able to help others also.

My goals for this blog throughout this new year consist of the following:

1. I want to bring more financial tips and tricks that I’ve learned, read, or came up with.

2. I want to learn how to coupon. For some people, couponing is really easy but for me it seems super complex and I’ll be blogging about everything I learn in the hopes that it’ll help others too.

3. I want to do a monthly DIY project. I want to keep it cheap but creative. Whether it’s redecorating a room or creating new storage solutions, it’ll all be here!

4. I want to learn how to go grocery shopping the proper way. How to plan weekly meals and then go to the store and get the things I need without having to make multiple trips (and hopefully be saving money with all the couponing that I learn to do 🙂 )

I’ll come up with more ways to evolve this blog throughout the year so stick around! Now that the holidays are over and everyone is kinda getting back in the swing of everyday life I think it’s a great time to start. I hope you guys are with me because this year is going to be great!

Have you noticed that back-to-school sales are slowly but surely making their way into the weekly circulars? Have you also noticed that I’ve totally been slacking on the blog? My bad! But there’s a reason behind it which I’m excited to share with you all.

Anyways, back to the school supplies. I know people REALLY don’t want to hear about school supplies in the middle of July but buying early will really save you some money. I was at Walmart on Sunday and freaked out over $.97 binders! DORK ALERT, I know. I can’t help myself. They also have sales on notebooks and folders and some other awesome stuff that I couldn’t resist. I even got a 6” desktop fan for my desk at work since the AC in our building is, at the very least, inconsistent. If you’re in need of some school supplies for yourself or for the kids Walmart is the place to go this week! I’ve looked at a lot of the store circulars and though Target has some sales they’re not as great as Walmart’s sales. One subject notebooks for $.17. $.15 two pocket folders and Crayola markers and colored pencils for under $1! Not to mention the chocolate pudding snack packs for $1! (YUM!) It doesn’t get much better than that. I also picked up some index cards which I really only use for my grocery lists and a few reminders here and there and they were under a $1 also. I love Walmart! I don’t go very often because 1) Target is a lot closer to me and 2) They’re renovating their store and the parking lot is a mess and the store itself looks like it was hit by a bomb but my most recent trip was definitely a success!

So, the reason I’ve been kinda ignoring the blog lately is because I kinda got a promotion at work! I’ve really been craving a change and more responsibility at work and the opportunity finally came and I was very excited to grab it. I’ve been training for the last week and a half and it’s been exhausting and nerve-wracking. I’ve been training all day and then coming home from work and re-writing my notes. I’ve been a very busy chick but I know it’ll pay off in the long run. The majority of my new position is accounts payable but a lot of it has to do with keeping records and staying organized which I love to do any ways. It’s just so hard to take in all this information in such a short amount of time. I hope I retained all of it but we’ll see. WISH ME LUCK!

If you’ve never heard of Snapfish, I feel sorry for you. I honestly get all of my pictures printed by them. Recently I started to get their photo books and they’re amazing!

Last week, I received my book that I had done for Rachel’s grad party and it turned out great. The quality is amazing and pretty much everything is customizable. It’s a great alternative to scrapbooks and makes the perfect gift. They have all different sizes from 5 x 7 all the way to 12 x 12 and 11 x 14. I’ve only gotten the 12 x 12 and the 8 x 11 and I’m telling you, they’re beautifully made.

Normally, the price of the books are anywhere from $11.99 – $59.99 but I got an email this morning and the 8 x 11 and 12 x 12 books are on sale! If you use promo code JUNE8X11 you can get an 8 x 11 book made for just $19 and that includes shipping! And if you use promo code JUNE12X12 you can get a 12 x 12 book that is usually $52.99 for only $29 and that also includes shipping. This deal is only good until 7/3 so hurry up and get over to snapfish, get creative, and get your customized photo book made.

Also, they have deals on their prints. You can get 100 prints for $9.99 including shipping by using promo code PRINTS999. You can get 300 prints for $28.99 including shipping by using promo code PRINTS2899. This deal is only good until 7/2.

Everyone knows I love photos and I love being able to fill my photo boxes so these deals are exciting.

I love setting goals and creating new projects for myself, if you haven’t noticed. Now that the grad party is over and there’s no more planning involved as far as that goes, I can turn my attention to something else.

Sam and I have been trying not to eat out as much as we do. 1) to save money and 2) to lose weight and get healthy. I’m not the best cook. I’ll be the first to let you know and I’m sure Sam will be the second – haha!.. I come from a family of really awesome women that can cook their booties off but I guess I never paid attention enough and I definitely regret that now. I really want to get into meal planning and learning new recipes. And when I say “new recipes” I mean ANY recipes at all. Unless we’re talking about grilled cheese. I can make a mean grilled cheese. Anyways, I purchased a few magnetic notepads on Friday that I think will help me stay organized while I try and figure everything out.

The plain notepad on the side is for any food items or whatever that I need to pick up from the store and the notepad on the right side is for our meal planning. This way we can plan and decide what we’re having from week-to-week.

If you haven’t noticed I’ve given up on the Blog Everyday in May challenge. I’ve been a little busy and kinda gave up. I’m a quitter :(… Anyways, I’m completely obsessed with the show Flea Market Flip on the HGTV channel. I was watching it this weekend and Laura Spencer said that some of her own projects were on her website which you can find here. I quickly picked up my laptop and was on the website for like an hour. One of my favorite projects was this one:

And the result was this:

Isn’t it adorable?! I love the mirror that she put on the side and the lower hooks for purses and bags. I’m definitely going to try this project.

I’m in trouble. I didn’t blog yesterday. The prompt for yesterday was something like, if you couldn’t answer with your job, what would you say that you do. My job is pretty unrewarding so I couldn’t come up with anything inspiring and yesterday was a really long day and I decided to skip it. So sue me!

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I hate writing about things that scare me because I don’t like admitting that I’m scared of anything, but the truth is… I am. There’s a couple things that I’m really scared of so I thought I would just share those.

One thing that really freaks me out is when I’m driving to Pittsburgh from New Jersey and I get near Philadelphia and the traffic gets really congested. It’s not stop and go kinda traffic, it’s like really fast, really congested traffic. I’m not nervous that I’ll get into an accident but my fear lies in other people’s driving ability. There are crazy drivers out there! So after I get passed Philly it’s pretty much smooth sailing the rest of the way to Pittsburgh.

Another thing that freaks me out is house centipedes! I google imaged them and couldn’t even look at them long enough to save the picture so you can google it or use your imagination. I don’t think everyone gets these but since our apartment is close to a small wooded area we get them all the time in the summer. And it’s so weird because I always see them. It’s like I have some sorta house centipede radar. My eyes always focus in on them when I see them on the walls and then I start breaking out into a cold sweat and more often than not, I start crying. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I cry. People cry, ya know! Geez, they’re the scariest, most unwelcomed, ugliest insects ever!

And that’s all I can come up with for now. I must seem really tough considering I could only come up with two fears of mine, but we’ve only scratched the surface!

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Hello and WELCOME! My name is Katie. I’m 29 years old and I live in Easton, PA. If I’m not busy making a complete mess of something then I’m usually busy organizing it. I overanalyze almost everything and like to hit the ground running. I’d say I’m somewhat of a free spirit in a sense that I like to get up and go whenever the mood strikes. My blog is full of silly stories, organizational tips/tricks, some DIY projects, and a lot of sarcasm and usually an awkward amount of profanity. Enjoy!